Fewer asylum seekers entering Manitoba

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This article was published 04/08/2017 (2997 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

With a growing surge of asylum seekers crossing into Manitoba through frozen farm fields last winter, government officials expected an even greater flood of migrants would arrive when the temperature got warmer. The province repurposed a shuttered seniors building close to the U.S. border in Gretna to serve as a reception centre and temporary shelter for the refugee claimants.

But, as the temperature rose, the number of asylum seekers crossing into Manitoba fell, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) numbers show. It posts the number of RCMP interceptions of asylum seekers who are apprehended between the ports of entry every month.

After intercepting 19 in January, 142 in February then 170 in March, there were 146 in April, 106 in May and just 63 in June, says Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada. It has not yet posted the number for July, but Winnipeg’s Welcome Place estimates from 70 to 80 refugee claimants arrived in July.

The situation is much different in Quebec, which has seen as many as 100 asylum seekers arriving per day. It’s opened Olympic Stadium in Montreal to shelter the swell of asylum seekers from the U.S. The number arriving in Quebec has grown to 781 in June from 245 in January, IRCC information shows. Many are reported to be Haitians who fled the massive earthquake in 2010 and were granted temporary protected status in the U.S. The Trump administration is now considering ending that program. Rather than waiting to be returned to Haiti, many are making a run for the Canadian border at Quebec.

Quebec has accounted for 3,350 of the 4,345 people intercepted by RCMP crossing into Canada this year till the end of June. Manitoba accounts for 646, the IRCC says.

Since it opened in early May, the reception centre in Gretna, 120 kilometres southwest of Winnipeg, has provided temporary housing for 218 refugee claimants, a provincial government spokeswoman said Thursday. Gretna isn’t where refugee claimants are crossing into Canada, but it’s only 28 kilometres from Emerson, which was inundated with asylum seekers earlier this year. More refugee claimants crossed into Canada on foot at Emerson in the first three months of 2017 (332) than in all of 2016 (266), numbers from Winnipeg’s Welcome Place show.

The volume of asylum claimants crossing the border fluctuates on a weekly basis, said the spokeswoman for the province. There are no plans to close the Gretna temporary shelter any time soon, she said.

“The department continues to operate the reception centre in Gretna with Welcome Place providing direct services, and will evaluate its options moving forward.”

carol.sanders@freepress.mb.ca